a bit of this video seems like it's just putting down other roguelites rather than explaining why isaac is so good. for necrodancer, you also left out a very significant part of its gameplay, and that's how different every character plays. isaac does this too, but only really goes far enough with half of the cast in tainted characters. talking about mods in the first section was also kind of weird- It should have 100% been a separate section since it's community content that wildly varies in quality.
@@Nikkibuh I talk about Necrodancer because it’s a good game! I even praise it for things that Isaac could learn from. I also do criticize Isaac for having many samey characters in the character section of the video.
I'm pretty surprised by your opinion on tainted jacob, and I think you're not giving the character enough credit. After dark esau was changed to be unkillable (on launch I admit he was borderline unplayable) I find him to be a very unique challenge with plenty of upsides to explore. Being pursued by an entity for the entire run is a cool idea for a challenge character imo, and if you learn to slingshot dark esau around with anima sola he can be very effectively used as a weapon. Dude's damage is insane, every boss in the early game is going to die near immediately when charged. Not only that, his charge ignores boss armor, meaning he can actually do serious damage to hush and delirium. Plus, if you let esau touch you after clearning the floor, you can give yourself flight to grab any out-of-reach items, like having the white fire from downpour II on every floor (minus mantle). I think having to manipulate dark esau's position to trick him into charging enemies while not boxing yourself in a corner makes you think about positioning in a way no other character does, and that's what makes him so fun to me.
The binding of isaac is my favorite game. It's how I made my best friend and has been with me for nearly a decade. This video does it justice and makes me appreciate it even more. Thank you.
With t.esau having infinite health, t.jacob is unironically one of if not the best character in the game unironically. Damage is the only stat that matters once you have too many hours in the game, and t.jacob starts with a nuke. If anything I want esau's damage nerfed because it trivializes the game to an unhealthy degree, but damage as a whole needs to be either removed outright or heavily reworked since being the only stat that ever, matters appart from tears which are just another measure of damage, it's not fun to have a run without any that feels like a slog or too much that feels free. I don't think I'll ever be able to truly express how awful damage feels in this game. After 800 hours or so I'm slowly realizing more and more how it's the only real stat and it sucks. Isaac is never about if you're going to get hit, but when (thanks rng) and killing everything faster almost always provides more defensive value than the dedicated defensive items. I'll always ALWAYS take a meat over a stopwatch for example, it's not even close how funny the difference in power is between quality 2 dps items a'd quality 4 defensive items. Or maybe playing the game too much left me to have plenty of damage-less 60 minutes+ runs that left a bad taste in my mouth even after thousands of okay runs, who knows. I've come to only play t.lost, t.jacob and other characters with starting damage when doing casual runs because they feel like the only characters balanced against bad rng.
I've always found active items to be my absolutely most disliked mechanic. They're the biggest contributor to item bloat by far, not only by themselves, but by the items that interact with them. To add to that, their effects are rarely well balanced. Most of the time they're either extremely underwhelming for late game, absolutely game winning on their own, or game breaking when combined with energy mechanics. I feel like these items should have their own separate way of obtaining them; Energy passive items should be removed; And other energy mechanics should be heavily limited. Anyhow great video for one of my favourite games of all time you're the best.
We didn’t need this. This felt fun to figure out as my own as a teen. Now this feels like one of those bogus creepypasta theories kids that haven’t seen a show tell you about when the show is brought up.
I'm curious 2 years later after making this video if your view of Greed Mode has changed at all. Cause originally I was with you and was pretty against it but now when all the dust has settled I think it's a fantastic game mode and can't imagine the game without it
Really hoping this hits the algorithm it hit mine and oh my am I glad I clicked on it. Have only spent 50 hours in the game and loving it so far and this video was a masterpiece to watch. This needs more views!!
I believe there’s another universe Nintendo is trying to tell us about. It’s clear by their designs (even in the earlier games) that Merlon, Merlee, Merluvee, Merlow, and clefts are not from the Mario universe.
the story of super paper mario and the characters and aesthetics are fine the gameplay is an absolute toilet bowl its not a paper mario rpg, it tries to be its own thing. but its also not a good platformer and not a good action game, they took the lock and key platforming mechanics of the paper mario series where mario has an awkward floaty jump timing, and what feels like zero horizontal acceleration and speed, from a game where you use that jump to slowly ascend rpg castle dungeons and use normal doors and spring elevators, and they purported the player should play an action platforming game with action platforming bosses using it. its the equivalent to taking any mario platformer and removing the long jump, air dive and run button the trimmed down busywork of a normal rpg in the paper mario series having a small item inventory and only needing to rarely swap badges / only occasionally swapping partners out of battle to do a field action or hit switches has been replaced with constantly scrolling through two menus of both active characters and like 20 pixls that get more frequent obnoxious usage like mario is now some kind of 20 zelda item swapping fiend (a series that quickly switched to 3+ bindable tool buttons) and don't get me started on the 3d space swapping button, the button you must press when walk into every single room, are forced to press to check for invisible enemies and platforms and items to progress constantly, which only brings back the series mainstay camera for a hassled limited time activation so yes the game is maligned; not because the story is bad (it's not) or the characters look a little weird (this is some 'celda' level amateur criticism of the game) or because they do a goofy chapter where they make fun of nerds and nerds didn't or were alleged to not have liked that. its because the game feels aggravating to play and interact with as this is a throwaway comment that won't be seen or read and i won't be returning to debate you, reader. cheers
I still don’t really like the game. Many call the gameplay inoffensive, but they neglect the serious problems it has when used as a device to convey the story. Dimentio is a great villain, and because of him gaining the power of the chaos heart, as well as the *harbinger of destruction Luigi* , he’s easily the strongest foe Mario has ever faced. The Ultimate Show, while not the best boss theme in the series, does great at portraying Dimentio’s personality and his chaotic power. With this information, how do you think the final fight against him goes? If you guessed that the fight was easy, boring, and over in a minute, you’d be correct! It takes away from the climax of the moment, and stops the player from hearing the full “The Ultimate Show” theme due to being over so quickly. Many of these problems apply to the Bleck fight prior, especially since he talks about how he won’t hold anything back and how the whole game has been building up to this moment. Thirty second fight, can’t hear the full boss theme. Bonechill is literally the Mario universe’s Lucifer, and he’s easy. Less than a minute for Mario to kill the literal devil. It takes away from the Luvbi twist in a way more so than the devs just bringing Luvbi back in the postgame. Can’t even hear the full fight theme. Mr. L is a great villain for the three chapters he exists in, and for a guy who brags about how strong Brobot is, both fights end in less than a minute. Has incredibly good boss themes, but you never hear them long enough to actually appreciate them. I love SPM’s story, I really do, and I love the music too, but I just can’t fully appreciate it due to how the gameplay manages to fumble everything up. Also, the whole worlds being destroyed thing would be way more effective if we got to know more than like three memorable characters per chapter. TTYD had stories for even the most random NPC, and using that concept in SPM would improve the narrative immensely.
I’ll say it. Boss fights were never good in other Paper Mario games. Every boss in the first two games can be beaten with no items and only basic attacks. Furthermore, most of them are defeated in 10 turns or less. The only reason battles last more than a minute is because you spend significantly more time scrolling through menus and waiting for animations/cutscenes. It’s just tedious. In Super Paper Mario, after spending some time to prepare for battle, the rest of the time is spent fighting. If Super Paper Mario forced the player to enter the menu and pick a character every time you wanted to use their move, the bosses would also be ten times longer. It sounds like you never talked to any of the NPCs after you first met them. All the NPCs in Super Paper Mario have unique stories and new dialogue every chapter. I found most unimportant NPCs in older games start repeating the same lines of dialogue once the chapter ends.
@@kumaranrvn5716 Okay, first paragraph response: Just because the bosses in the first two games could be beat with basic actions doesn’t make SPM any better. The fact that you’re forced into using just basic actions in SPM aside from Bowser’s broken fire and don’t really have any option at all on how to approach bosses aside from the singular path the devs chose makes the boss fights in SPM just as bad as the boss fights in Sticker Star and Color Splash. Mario and Luigi does have a better track record for boss fights than Paper Mario, though. Second paragraph response: Bosses being short isn’t a good thing. Sure, being extremely long like Elder Princess Shroob in M&L: Partners in Time is not good either, but a short fight can very much take away from the atmosphere of a moment, like with Dimentio and Bleck, who would both be much better if they actually had good fairly long fights. Dimentio is better than Olly in personality and plot, but Olly is better than Dimentio in terms of the actual fights. Third paragraph response: Okay? That doesn’t remove the problem. The only areas in game with Dialogue that changes after every story event are Flipside and Flopside. While this applies to TTYD as well with Rogueport, it’s nowhere near as bad since area NPC’s do get quite a few changes during their chapter (like with Glitzville and The Excess Express). You’re telling me a random boring looking Flipside civilian complaining about nothing is more interesting than the Goomba hit man in TTYD? The newer games while having bland characters at least aren’t trying to tell a story about everything in the universe dying. When I think of a good doomsday narrative in a game, I think of Majora’s Mask because every NPC has a story that occurs during the cycle and you start to care for quite a few of them, and want them to continue living. I don’t think SPM is a good doomsday narrative because you barely meet anyone in each chapter that you can actually care for.
@@MySnugglePuppy If I can beat the game with only basic attacks, then there is no thought required for bosses. You can spam the same two basic attacks for the whole game, which have the exact same buttons and timing for all enemies. Still, saying that a turn-based RPG, a game where you’re forced to get attacked, is harder than an action RPG isn’t saying much. When comparing older Paper Mario to other turn-based RPG, they lack any challenge I would expect and don’t require any strategy or skill. I wouldn’t call them balanced either. Badges are either extremely contextual or always worth equipping, there is no in between. In the first game, Watt is the only partner I used in normal battles and most bosses because he ignores defense. In Thousand Year Door, later partners are better than earlier ones in nearly every way, which is better than the first game but still not balanced. Since Super Paper Mario battles are real time, there’s more things to worry about than simply how much damage you deal. You can use Mario to flip and avoid enemies or find their hit box/weakness. Peach has more control in the air and can block against all damage. Bowser can deal more damage, but is slower and has a bigger hit box, so you likely take more damage. Luigi can also deal more damage to enemies that are above you, and has a small hit box. Super Paper Mario is easy because you can grind and become overleveled much faster. The older games were always easy regardless of your level. Even when you oversimplify chapter 1 of Super Paper Mario, Thousand Year Door doesn’t sound much better. In Super Paper Mario, you start off visiting Bestovious to learn the technique of flipping between dimensions. After traversing Mount Lineland, Mario arrives at Yold Town, which is where the Tribe of Ancients settled and their descendants live in the town. There, you discover one of the Pixls. Old Man Watchitt tells them to cross the Yold Dessert to find the ruins where the Pure Heart is. On the way, you confront and defeat O’Chunks. After finishing the Ruins, you have an interaction with Fracktail and Dimentio. Finally, you meet Merlumina for the Pure Heart, who is said to have created Flipside. The story proceeds to Castle Bleck for an intermission. That last point is wrong. All the NPCs in chapters 1-5 of Super Paper Mario also have new dialogue after every chapter. For example, in chapter 1, we learn that Bestovious is the cousin of Watchitt. Bestovious outshined Watchitt in everything. As a result, he was supposed to be the next mayor. However, Bestovious left the town to pursue his own dreams, and Watchitt was stuck being mayor. The two never talked for a long time. But after learning about some of their older memories throughout the game, they decide to go meet each other. In addition, Red and Green learn to put aside their differences, Bozzo is learning how to be the new mayor, and the other NPCs tell you how the town was built. Nobody mentions anything about the Void until the end of the game. Flipside/Flopside have the most interesting NPCs in the series because of how their opinions and personalities oppose each other’s version. m.ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-iuVgPMLbCs0.html&pp=iAQB On the other hand, Koops has some minor character growth, despite not doing anything other than tagging along with Mario. Once the chapter ends, his story is over, except for a single cutscene at the end of the game. As for the other NPCs, they repeat the same dialogue for the rest of the game, which makes the town feel hollow and forgettable. There are a few new Troubles, but that’s about it.
@@kumaranrvn5716 I’m not ignoring the problems with the older games. TTYD has a frankly boring combat system, but it’s better than this. You act like strategy is required for SPM boss fights with which character you use, but we all know any casual player will just use Bowser because he’s broken. If you’re planning on bringing up how you can challenge yourself by not using Bowser, keep in mind you can challenge yourself in TTYD by only leveling up specific stats, and it’s frankly more challenging. I will admit I was wrong about the dialogue changes in SPM, but Flipside and Flopside do not have the most interesting NPCs in the series. Most have designs that rival the modern Toads in terms of blandness, and though the concept of reverse personalities is cool, they really don’t do much with it. Why is Nolrem just another Merlon personality-wise? Shouldn’t he be a moron as a mirror to Merlon’s smarts? The chefs are both just less interesting versions of the chefs from the first two games, and they even have essentially the same personalities. I will admit SPM’s first chapter is more interesting than I gave it credit for, but it still isn’t that good. The later chapters in TTYD and 64 still decimate the later chapters in SPM. You complain about Koops’ arc ending quickly, but at least he has an arc at all. You can’t even say that about the Pixls. I will now bring up some of the bad parts of SPM to prove that it isn’t that good: - The entirety of world four, five, and seven are awful to play. The only redeeming parts are the narrative, except for seven’s case because Luvbi’s sacrifice ultimately doesn’t matter since she’s revived. - The pits of 100 trials in SPM are horrendously bad, but you probably already know that. - Navigating Flipside and Flopside is a nightmare, even if you manage to pay the shortcut guy. The heart pillars serve no purpose other than padding. - Sammer’s Kingdom loses its excuse to be tedious in the postgame. - Most level environments in the first five worlds of the game are bland and uninspired, though not as much as Sticker Star. - There are basically no partners, and the characters we do have are: Mario, the guy with no personality. Peach, the character who was perfected in TTYD. Bowser, who’s admittedly great here as he is in most RPGs. And Luigi, the guy who’s more interesting when you don’t play as him and you only play as him for seven levels in the main story. Tippi is pretty good, but even then all she does in gameplay is tattle the enemies. TTYD has a ton of flaws as well, but fixing them wouldn’t involve drastically changing the game, as we see with the remake. SPM’s flaws would require a complete shift in gameplay focus. I’ve also got to be honest here: No Paper Mario game has good combat. At best the combat is boringly repetitive, and at worst it’s completely pointless. If you want good Mario RPG gameplay, go play Mario & Luigi.
@@MySnugglePuppy You act like every casual player knows how to use Bowser efficiently, when they don’t. Bowser is used efficiently on less than half the bosses: mostly just O’Chunks and Super Dimentio. Bowser is completely useless against Brobot and Bonechill, and casual players take a lot of damage when using him for King Croacus, Mimi Chapter 6, and Count Bleck. I don’t see how leveling specific stats would make a difference since I never had to use FP or BP to beat the game, just basic attacks. At that point, I would try to not level up at all, which is something you could do in Super Paper Mario. I just disagree on the NPCs. I find them a lot more interesting than taking generic Mario enemies, giving them a hat, and calling it an NPC. And no, Norlem is opposite to Merlon in that he descends from the Tribe of Darkness instead. Even though he helps the heroes, he is more pessimistic and believes the Dark Prognosticus truly is the right prophecy. At least Super Paper Mario has other playable characters, recurring villains, and NPCs with their own arcs. Partners are generally the only characters that have all plot relevance in older games, so forgettable partners means the entire chapter is forgettable. Disagree with most of these points. None of the chapters are as awful as the hallways and amount of backtracking in older games. Super Paper Mario has levels, which means a lot less backtracking and easier to keep track of where to go. You’re never required to go back to completed levels like Sticker Star either. Older games can make you backtrack across the entire chapter and even to previous chapters for story progression. Flipside Pit is definitely worth doing and is better than Thousand Year Door. Flopside Pit is bad only because you have to do it twice, but the reward is definitely worth it. You contradict yourself. The purpose of the heart pillars is so that players don’t get lost exploring the town. Every time you revisit Flipside, a new portion opens up using your new abilities. You start with two floors, then the bottom floors, then the outskirts, etc. Once you get to Flopside, the same thing happens. Flipside has much better pacing than all the other games, in which the entire hub world opens up very early in those games. You can fully explore the hub world at the start, so there’s no reason to ever revisit it. Just immediately start the next chapter. Sammer Kingdom is a post game challenge. I don’t see the issue with having extra content for people who want it. Chapter 1 is the only one that can be considered bland, combining grassland and desert into one chapter. A bog that leads into a mansion during sunset, a pixelated world, outer space (before Mario Galaxy, when space wasn’t overused), and prehistoric land/caverns. Meanwhile, the original Paper Mario has grasslands, desert, ghost house, forest/lava, and snow for most of the worlds. At least Mario is more expressive and you still get dialogue from Tippi instead. Peach is just as good here, and now isn’t limited to talking only during intermissions. Luigi basically takes the role of Peach in the older games, but is more relevant and you still get to play as him. I definitely think Thousand Year Door has some major flaws that would require a lot of rework. Considering that I only played the remake, I have no idea what major flaws were fixed from the original game. I do agree that the Mario and Luigi games do a much better job at capturing the Mario charm, and have unique mechanics for every game. Thousand Year Door combat was a near identical copy of the original Paper Mario, which already felt generic and mundane compared to other RPGs. At least Super Paper Mario innovated and went for an action RPG with a flipping mechanic, which resembles Mario games a lot better.
*_In the realm of Hallownest,_* *_where the knights do reign,_* *_A new threat doth arise, a_* *_power so profane,_* *_The Godmaster, with a vision_* *_so grand,_* *_Hath brought forth a_* *_darkness,_* *_to this fair land._* *_The Pure Vessel, once a_* *_beacon of light,_* *_Hath been corrupted, by the_* *_Godmaster's might,_* *_Now a vessel of darkness,_* *_filled with despair,_* *_The once bright hope, now a_* *_vessel of snare._* *_With each step, the darkness_* *_doth spread,_* *_A cancer of the soul, a plague in the head,_* *_The Godmaster's power, doth_* *_twist and corrupt,_* *_Leaving naught but ruin, and_* *_a world in dispute._* *_The knights of Hallownest,_* *_must stand tall,_* *_Against this darkness, they_* *_must not fall,_* *_For if they do, the_* *_Godmaster's reign,_* *_Shall bring eternal night, and_* *_end all gain._* *_So let us rally, and stand as_* *_one,_* *_Against the Godmaster, and_* *_his dark throne,_* *_For in the end, we shall_* *_emerge victorious,_* *_And Hallownest shall be free,_* *_from his tyranny._*
its hilarious to.. refuse to save the world.. one thing that made me sad with super paper mario. well 2 things is. one... lack of lava!!, and 2. the only water level was in pixal land rather then the proper graphics of other areas.
I genuinely loved listening to the interview, it helped me really see what their thoughts on things are and why certain things were implemented. As a relatively new isaac player with only 61 hours, this was an awesome listen.
i honestly never realized the whole computer world part, and i have something supporting your point about it all being digital, im listening to the soundtrack right now, and theres a song called "Swoon.exe", i honestly have no idea how i never realized though
None of this changes that the game was widely viewed as a letdown when it came out. I loved the first two and I was beyond excited for this game. It felt nothing like the first 2. The disappointment of this game still stings almost 20 years later.
I noticed a lot of the problems you had with some of the badly designed characters also game from earlier versions, Cain and Judas for example have been relatively unchanged since Wrath of the Lamb, and Eve pretty much always had bad damage especially before you get the razor blade.
Super paper Mario has been my favourite game all my life since i played it on the wii for the first time. I’m now 20 and keep playing it over 10 years later
For me, personally, my issue with the artsyle is that it's way, way too jarring. Everything that comes from a previous game, including Mario himself, feels beyond out of place in this game. All the new characters and all of the worlds feel cohesive between themselves, but clash with everything else. I get that it's supposed to be like this, to show that this is a different world, but I think the game just overdoes it. I much prefer the way Super Mario Odyssey handles its clashing artsyles. I feel it has more variety and focuses it on the many different worlds that look different from another rather than a set that all share an artistic integrity.
